The First Case
by mpenguin15
Summary: Jane and Lisbon's first case they've ever worked together.
1. Introductions

**Sorry if Lisbon is a little out of character when she has her thinking... for some reason she's harder to write then Jane. Also, just to point out, there's no fluff in this story at all.**

**And of course I don't own Mentalist**

**~Mpenguin**

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><p>Chapter One: Introductions<p>

With the early afternoon sunlight slipping in through the windows, Patrick Jane tapped his foot absentmindedly, watching Agent Virgil Minelli as he looked blankly at papers on his desk, tapping his pencil against his desk impatiently.

_He obviously doesn't want me here,_ thought Jane as he gained knowledge about his soon to be boss_, my presence must make him uncomfortable and unable to focus on his paperwork, which I assume he's simply pretending to do so that this silence between us isn't too awkward. _

Agent Minelli suddenly looked up and said, "I'm sorry about Agent Lisbon's lateness. She usually is on time, she probably got called to a case."

"I understand; it's no big deal." Jane answered adding in his head, _or she hooked up with someone. I hope it's the first though; the sooner I get working on Red John the closer I am to killing that bastard._

It only took a few more moments of silence before the door burst open and a woman said, "Sorry Sir, was called on a case and it took longer then I expected to look at the crime scene."

Turning his head around to see his new partner, Jane was surprised at the woman that stood in front of him. She was pretty and… _small_. She was still average size, but he had expected her to be much taller, not the petite woman that stood looking between him and Agent Minelli.

Jane wasn't the only one looking over their new partner. Lisbon too looked over Jane with a bit of a questionable air. It wasn't that she was surprised to find him handsome, though at how attractive she found him unnerved her a bit; it was a sudden gut feeling that told her one word, _trouble_.

"Ah, excellent. You've finally arrived Lisbon." Minelli said, grabbing both of their attention. "Now, shall we get this deal signed?"

"Yes sir." Agent Lisbon said as she settled herself down in a chair next to Jane.

"Right, so here's the consultant agreement." Minelli continued, grabbing a document that was lying on the side of his desk, "I've already filled you two in on this but I'll just sum it up once again. Mr. Patrick Jane you will be consulting with Agent Lisbon and try your best to help her solve the crime she's dealing with. Lisbon, Mr. Jane will be your complete responsibility, you have to look after him while out in the field. And Mr. Jane, if you are injured during an investigation, by signing this contract, you cannot sue the CBI. Any questions?"

"Yes, I have one." Lisbon said and turning her head towards Jane asked, "Mr. Jane, what exactly can you do? To help me solve a crime?"

Taking a moment to think of an answer, for he actually hadn't given this much thought, Jane then answered, "I'm good at reading people." And when he saw the slight puzzled look on her face that demanded more detail, he continued, "I can tell when people are lying, I'm good at figuring out when they're hiding something, and I'm very good at pulling out secrets others would rather keep hidden."

After a moment of consideration, Agent Lisbon nodded her head and turned her attention towards Minelli again, who, when he saw that she was satisfied with the answer, asked again, "Any more questions?"

This time, neither of them said anything.

"Alright then. Mr. Jane, could you sign here, " Minelli directed, pointing to the line at the bottom left hand corner, "And Lisbon, would you sign here." he said, pointing this time at the bottom right hand corner.

Both getting up, Jane grabbed a pen at Minelli's pencil holder and Lisbon waited as he scratched his signature, trying to quickly discern her sudden gut feeling. Not that she usually used her gut anyway, it was unprofessional, but this was one time she took it under consideration.

_Trouble? How much trouble can he be? I don't even know the man._ Lisbon thought reasonably. _But, if I'm actually going to be listening to my gut, if he's trouble, he'll be good trouble. What the hell? Can there actually be good trouble? God, I think there's something wrong with my gut. And why in the hell am I giving this so much thought? I mean really, having him be my consultant can't be any life-changing decision._

When he finished signing, Lisbon quickly decided just to agree to it and then bent over to sign.

"So, Lisbon," Minelli said as she straighten back up, "take your consultant and brief him on the case you've just received."

With a swift nod, she went over to the door and held it open for Jane to walk through. When he did, she followed behind. As they walked their way through the CBI building, Jane glanced around, taking in things, and couldn't help noticing Agent Lisbon's uncomfortable and nervous posture.

"Do I need to show around first?" Agent Lisbon eventually asked as they waited for a man in handcuffs to walk past with the agent who was directing him.

"Nah, I'll figure things out myself." Jane answered.

Nodding her head, she headed off down the hall again and Jane followed. They walked on in silence again until Lisbon turned into a bullpen. There, Jane saw three men who sat at desk looking up at them. The one closest to the entrance was middle aged, probably the oldest of the group, and had blond kind of buzz-cut hair, rather small brown eyes, and probably medium high from how he was sitting. Cross the little pathway that was created from the desk of the blond was an Asian man, probably Koran; he was probably the shortest one there, black hair, black eyes, and a frown that showed he was a no-nonsense kind of person. The last man that sat at the desk furthest back was the tallest and youngest person in the group and was the worst in the group to hide his curious glances at Jane.

"Guys, this is Mr. Patrick Jane." Lisbon, whom Jane had noticed was now in her element and no longer uncomfortable, told the three men, "Mr. Jane is the consultant you've heard about that would be joining us. Mr. Jane," She continued now looking at him, "this is the team. The one in the front here is Special Agent Thomas Hummer. Then there's Special Agent Kimball Cho, and back there is Special Agent Wayne Rigsby."

Jane smiled and said a little cheerful hello, Agent Rigsby and Agent Hummer mumbled hello back while Agent Cho just nodded.

"Alright then. Since we've been all introduced, time to work on the case." Lisbon said briskly.

_Finally_, Jane thought eagerly as his anticipation grew. Now came the moment he had been waiting for. He had finally started. Today was the day he would start hunting down Red John.

"Hummer." Agent Lisbon suddenly snapped, "What do you have?"


	2. Case Briefing

**Hey, sorry but I kind of have writer's block on this story. This chapter's short and not interesting, hopefully the next one's better.**

**~mpenguin**

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><p><strong>Chapter Two: Case Briefing <strong>

"Victim's name is Carl Henderson, age 32, CEO for some sport corporation here in Sacramento." Agent Hummer stated, offering the file over to Agent Lisbon, which she took.

"Forensics believes that he was struck in the head by a cylinder object, like a pipe." Agent Rigsby told his boss, who had looked up from the file to listen to him, "Though they think that didn't kill him. They say that he was only knocked unconscious from the blow then thrown off the pier where he drowned."

"Cheery." Agent Lisbon scoffed, "You got anything Cho?"

"He doesn't have much of a recorded Boss," Cho said bluntly.

Meanwhile, as this whole conversation went down as if it were lines from a play, Jane listened to it with confusion.

_Was I sent to the right unit?_ He thought with frustration as he listened to them ramble on about the man_, Where's the Red John information? Why aren't they discussing him?_

"You got all of that, Mr. Jane?" Agent Lisbon suddenly turned around and asked him, causing him to snap out of his thoughts.

"Yes, but one question. Do you work the Red John case?"

Confusion appeared on her face for a split second before it disappeared and she told him, "Uh, yeah we do. Why are you asking?"

"Why aren't you working on his case now." Jane said, ignoring her question and cutting in with his own.

"Because we do other cases besides just that one." Lisbon said with a bit of an edge.

Nodding his head, Jane then fell silence and started to sway a bit on his feet.

Trying her best not to shake her head, Lisbon then turned to her team, who had been giving each other curious glances.

Lisbon then started to bark out commands, "Hummer, go over to the company he was working for and see if you can dig up any information there. Cho, go with him. Rigsby, you stay here. You have desk duty."

Her team members nodded their heads to show they understood and both Cho and Hummer got up to leave. Rigsby had a grim grin as he watched his co-workers leave and then looked over at his computer screen. _Sorry Rigsby, but that's what being a rookie does to you,_ Lisbon thought to herself, trying her best to hide her smile.

Turning around to look at her new consultant, Lisbon nearly jumped with surprise to see that he wasn't standing where she left him. _What the,_ she thought with frustrated as she whipped herself around and spotted him sitting on the ugly leather couch.

Staring at him for a moment, Lisbon quickly made up her mind what to do with him and then walking up to him, said, "Mr. Jane, we'll be going to the victim's house to see if we can get clues there."

Jane, who had been deep in thought until her voice had brought him out of it, said, "You go on without me. I'll stay here."

"Excuse me?" Lisbon snapped, momentary caught off guard.

"I said, I'll stay right here." Jane said, looking up at her and grinned a fantastic white smile.

Lisbon tensed up as she felt Rigsby freeze to concentrate on eavesdropping on the conversation and, grimacing, told Jane in a low growl so he couldn't hear, "Mr. Jane, you signed a contract saying that you'll help me with cases. Now, get up and we're going."

Fortunately, Jane was a master had hiding his expressions so Agent Lisbon wasn't able to see how his face had fell_. Damn contract_, he thought angry_, it didn't mention that I would be working on other cases too._ But knowing that if he refused, he would never get the Red John file, Jane slowly got up and gave Lisbon another grin.

To his surprise, she didn't melt to it and then she snapped, "You first."

With a shrug he started out the door thinking, _damn, this isn't going the way I planned._

Just behind him, Lisbon was thinking, _Fuck! Here comes trouble._


	3. Battle of the Will

**Chapter 3: Battle of the Will **

Lisbon sat across the weeping widow, feeling awkward and sympathy towards the woman. From personal experience, Lisbon knew exactly how it felt when a stranger with a police badge comes into your home, telling you that a loved one has past away and Lisbon despised nothing more then being the barer of that news.

_Mr. Jane, however, seems to be at eased with the whole thing._ Lisbon thought, giving him a quick aggravated glace. He seemed almost bored with the whole scene, bouncing lightly on his feet and looking around the room as if he was a person looking at a house for sale.

As the sound of the widow's crying subsided a bit, Lisbon took a little steadying breath and asked, "Mrs. Henderson, would you be alright if we asked you some questions? If not, we can come back later…"

"No" The woman whimpered, wiping her tears away with her sleeves, "The sooner I get this over with the better. Plus, if I don't tell you now, the murder might have a larger chance of getting away."

Nodding her head from lack of words to say, Lisbon quickly pulled out her black notebook and asked, "Was your husband having any trouble at work?"

"No. No, everything was fine. Money was good, he was happy going to work, no trouble was going on as far as I knew." She said, swallowing a sob.

"But you didn't know much, did you?" Jane suddenly cut in, causing both the grieving widow and Lisbon to look up at him with surprise.

"Well, uh, no, not really." She admitted, "Carl wasn't one to talk about his troubles much. If he did, or maybe if I asked him more, I could have helped him more and then he… he" And she broke off again and started to sob.

Lisbon whipped her head back at Jane and gave him an incredulous look; he, however, gave her an innocent shrug and went back to looking around the room curiously.

"Um, I'm sorry to ask this Mrs. Henderson, "Lisbon said again, trying to reset the interrogation," but were you and Mr. Henderson having any trouble at home?"

"No. God no, everything was good. Fine. He was excited to be a father, always paying attention to Michael. Treated me well, as always, even better actually, ever since he found out I was pregnant with Michael. Everything was great."

"But you wouldn't sleep with him?" Jane cut in once again.

"What?" Lisbon snapped and Mrs. Henderson sniffled.

"Sleep with him?" Jane repeated again, "As in, have sex, make love to him, do it with him, etc. ect."

"No, not since I got pregnant with Michael." Mrs. Henderson said stiffly, "Why does that matter?"

"So you were alright with that?"

"Well, yes."

"And your husband was too?"

"I think so."

"So you were fine with him cheating on you?"

"What? No! Carl would never do that!" Mrs. Henderson said, her voice getting slightly hysterical, "never! He would never!"

"Well he was," Jane said, cutting her off, "do you have any idea…"

"Mr. Jane!" Lisbon snapped, shutting him up and turning back to Mrs. Henderson said, "I'm so sorry for that, and for your lost. We'll be going now and if we have any questions, we'll contact you again. And I promise, he won't be there next time."

The widow nodded her head mutely and started to weep again and Lisbon quickly got up and signaled Jane to go as well, which he did with a shrug. As soon as the front door of the Henderson residence was shut behind them, Lisbon growled at him.

"Mr. Jane, you cannot do that!" She hissed, walking after him, trying her best to contain her anger.

"Why? I was simply asking questions." He scoffed.

"She just found out her husband is dead! And here you are sprouting out things like her husband was cheating on her!"

"Well, he was."

"You have no proof!"

"I had no idea how clueless CBI agents were." Jane smirked as he suddenly halted and she along with him, "Well, Agent Lisbon, if I must spell it out to you, I will. The house looked like a man doesn't spend much time there, he treated her extra well during and after the pregnancy, which was during the time he stopped sleeping with her, so the treatment was out of guilt. Plus a man his age and of his personality simply can't keep it in his pants for _that_ much time. And you could tell that his wife was having doubts of his faithfulness. She had an idea that he was cheating on her; most wives do after all.

"How do you know?" Lisbon snapped.

"Well, Agent Lisbon," Jane mocked, "do I really have to point out everything? Just watch her face next time; it was all there. "

Lisbon stood there for a moment trying to figure out how on earth he got that information and, looking at his arrogant smile, snapped and said, "You're totally bullshitting me, aren't you?

"Why on Earth would I do that?" Jane laughed, but yet there was no amusement in his eyes.

"I don't believe you." Lisbon retorted with anger, "you're just making all this stuff up so we could go back to the CBI and you can get your hands on the Red John files."

"Now, why would I lie to do that? I get them either way." Jane told her, beginning to walk away from her.

"Mr. Jane." Lisbon called out to him coldly, her temper had reached its breaking point, "Whether you were right or not, your behavior in there was not acceptable. And, until I'm certain that you won't do it again, don't you even think that you'll be able to get your hands on the Red John file."

He frozen for a moment, considering what she had said, but then started on his way again without a single glance back.

_Damn_, Lisbon cursed, _what have I gotten myself into? I should have never agreed with this. And if there is one thing I'm was most certain of, it's this; this is not the worst side of Mr. Patrick Jane. It's going to be the battle of wills_, Lisbon thought grumpily_. Damn him! _


End file.
